After Visiting Friends by Michael Hainey

In 1970, Chicago newspaperman Robert Hainey died suddenly in the early hours of the morning. He was thirty-five and left behind a wife and two young sons, one of whom was Michael Hainey, then six years old.  Michael’s mother, Barbara, never discussed the death with her sons and curtly cut off all questions. This only heightened Michael’s need to know. When he was older, he found his father’s obituaries in library archives. He read that his father died on a Chicago street far from both his home and his workplace. The phrase “after visiting friends” was used, although the family had no friends in that area of Chicago. The desire to know the facts remained with Michael into adulthood. He became a journalist and eventually used his training to investigate the circumstances of his father’s death. His father’s co-workers claimed to be unable to tell him anything. But that was an answer he was unwilling to accept. He worked for years, searching out old medical records and finding long-ago acquaintances of his father’s until he arrived at the difficult truth. But he considered truth, as difficult as it was, better than ignorance or misinformation. In After Visiting Friends, the author has written a memoir about the difficulty of growing up fatherless in 1970’s Chicago, a time and place when there were no grievance counselors and stoic silence was considered a virtue.

Check out After Visiting Friends @ the library! 

Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen

Claire Waverly, a highly-sought caterer, has an instinctive flair for cooking and more – her food has magical properties. She’s a bit of a solitary recluse, living and working alone in the house where she grew up, and she is perfectly content with her lifestyle. Then her sister, Sydney, returns home to Bascom, North Carolina, after a long absence, and disrupts everything. She has a five-year-old daughter, the niece Claire did not know she had, and she needs shelter from an abusive ex-boyfriend. As the two sisters confront each other and the abuse in their own shared past, Claire is forced to drop her guard, which opens the door for new possibilities.

Sarah Addison Allen describes Garden Spells as Southern-fried magical realism with a love story at its heart. It also has an ornery apple tree that flings prophetic apples at people. If you like Alice Hoffman, you might also like Sarah Addison Allen. Now is a good time to read Garden Spells and her other novels The Sugar Queen, The Girl Who Chased the Moon, and The Peach Keeper. Her new novel Lost Lake, is set to release early in 2014.

Check out Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen @ the library!

Happy Holidays!

We're taking a break for the holidays! We'll be back on Friday with another great read that someone on our staff thinks you'll love!

The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd

This new novel by the acclaimed author of The Secret Life of Bees tells the unlikely stories of two very different women in 19^th century Charleston.  Spanning more than thirty years, Kidd reveals the lives of Sarah Grimké: middle child in a large, wealthy South Carolina family and Hetty Handful Grimké: a slave owned by the Grimké family.  We begin in 1803 around the time of Sarah’s eleventh birthday.  The young girl is presented with two very different gifts: a chance to graduate from the nursery into her very own bedroom and a slave for her own personal maid.  Immediately Sarah tries to refuse the second “gift” from her mother.  This only ends in Sarah embarrassing her mother in front of a bunch of guests and having to write out many apology letters.

Late that same evening, Sarah sneaks into her father’s study to copy out a manumission document in order to free Hetty Handful outright.  Her father is a very important lawyer.  Surely he will carry out her wishes? Sarah remarks “What could Father do but make Hetty’s freedom as legal and binding as her ownership?  I was following a code of law he’d fashioned himself!” But when Sarah finds the document torn in two and lying in front of her bedroom door the next morning, she knows that helping Handful obtain her freedom will be more difficult than she’d imagined. 

Kidd allows us to see the two girls grow in friendship though their backgrounds are very different.  But Kidd also allows the reader a glimpse into the horror and brutality of slavery.  As we get to know Handful, we see that her mother Charlotte has dreams of freedom.  Though the woman is an expert seamstress and clearly the most valuable slave in the Grimké home, she is not content.  After years of bowing, scraping, and saving money from odd jobs outside the household, Charlotte disappears.  Handful, while heartbroken that she has been left behind, hopes that her mother is living somewhere as a free woman. 

Sarah grows and changes as the years go by.  She begs to become the godmother of her youngest sister, Nina, and her influence on the child is very apparent.  While Sarah quietly changes her religious views and begins to study abolition, Nina is a girl of outspoken and firm conviction.  After both women are jilted by potential husbands, the two join forces and become the first female voices for abolition; travelling all over the northern states speaking to other women about their views. 

Kidd has found an interesting way to bring the very real Grimke sisters to life.  Readers who enjoy historical fiction will not be disappointed in Kidd’s third novel.  TheInvention of Wings is available everywhere on January 7th, 2014.

The Testament of Mary by Colm Toiben

The Testament of Mary is a new look at an age-old story.  According to legend, Mary the Mother of Jesus lived out the end of her life in Ephesus, Turkey, an important city in early Christianity.  It is in this city that she gives her testament, hoping to understand the events that eventually became the story told in the New Testament, events that she admits “unhinged” her.  This Mary is not the dutiful saintly woman of Christian teaching and her recounting of events does not correspond to that in the Bible.  She does not agree that her son is the Son of God.  She is angry about her son’s death and at both his followers and herself for not protecting him from his gruesome fate. At the end of her life she is in hiding, living among strangers, dependent on two men she does not like or trust, possibly John and Luke. Colm Toibin’s Mary is a tragic human woman, imperfect, doubtful and frightened. The Testament of Mary is a book for readers open to examining another point of view.

Check out The Testament of Mary @ the library!

Slow Getting Up by Nate Jackson

Have you ever wondered what it's like to be on a professional football team? Maybe not a starter like Aaron Rodgers or Clay Matthews, but that guy who sits on the bench and gets paid to play? Did you ever wonder how hard can it be? If that thought has ever crossed your mind, then Slow Getting Up by Nate Jackson is the book for you.

Like the sub-title implies, this is a story of NFL survival. He may not have been a star, and unless you were in Denver while he was playing you might not know who he is, he was out there, some weeks getting into some games, and earning a world of hurt.

For Nate Jackson, football was just a part of life, and he would do anything to be able to keep playing. When he was cut from the Cal Poly team, he transferred to a Division III school. His coaches there saw professional talent, and before he knew it, the 49ers were calling him. Sure he was un-drafted, traded to Denver and barely made the practice squad, but he was a professional athlete.

Slow Getting Up it is the perfect book a the football fanatic or just a fan of the game. Nate Jackson gives a behind the scenes tour of a NFL football team in this memoir, and after reading it you'll be happy you just have to watch the game from the comfort of your living room.

Check out Slow Getting Up @ the library!

Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm- Ravaged Hospital by Sheri Fink

 

Sheri Fink, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, presents the harrowing events that took place at Memorial Medical Center before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina.  Without a sure disaster plan the hospital was woefully underprepared for the devastating storm.  Facing life or death decisions the staff made questionable choices that led to an involved investigation and criminal charges ultimately being brought against a doctor and two nurses.  We may never know exactly what happened during those five days but this book takes as comprehensive a look as possible at all sides.   

Checkout Five Days at Memorial @ the library!

Slimed! The Oral History of Nickelodeon's Golden Age by Mathew Klickstein

Did you ever wish you could take the physical challenge to get out of a test? How about wishing for a best friend who would climb through your window? Do you still look above for the slime when someone says "I don't know?" Do you wish you could submit stories for the approval of the midnight society?

Now, you are either confused,or reliving some of the best TV memories from your childhood. If you picked the latter, then Slimed! is the book for you. Mathew Klickstein has gathered interviews from Nickelodeon executives, show runners and actors from the early days, meaning the 1980's and early 1990's. From the people trying to start a network for kids, to the teens starring in the shows, no one is left without a say. And no matter if you dreamed of winning big on Double Dare, or just wishing you could go to Camp Anawanna, no early show is left untouched.

This is definitely for those readers who remember the early days of Nickelodeon, however even if you caught the shows in re-run, or just want to know more about the early days of a growing television channel, Slimed is a must read!

Check out Slimed! @ the library!

We Live in Water by Jess Walter

 

We Live in Water is a wonderful collection of short stories by Jess Walter, author of previously reviewed Beautiful Ruins. Many of these stories are about parents, often working-class or even criminal class, and their relationships with children. Some succeed in making a moment or an hour in a child’s life better. Some, despite their best intentions, neglect and even endanger the children.  Most, despite being slightly bewildered, strive to do their best, as poor as that might be. These straightforward and simply told stories are about the poor, the uneducated, and the down-and-out of Spokane, Washington, people who seemingly never had a chance. A homeless man panhandles to buy his son a gift. Some con men are not as smart as they think they are. A man, intending to take his stepfather to his prison-release kidney dialysis treatment, instead takes him fishing, and this seems like the right thing to do. An ex-con doing community service reads to a second grader who brings the same book every time.  “Thief” is about a traditional family—two parents, three children. In “Thief,” Wayne, the father, is a blue-collar worker. He puts a lot of effort into trying to discover which of his children (the girl, the middle or the little) is stealing from the family vacation fund, a jar where Wayne throws his spare change. What he discovers surprises both Wayne and the reader. The final story in this book is not actually a short story but a list of facts about Spokane and Walter’s life there, grim facts that reveal the inspiration for these insightful stories.

 

Check out We Live in Water @ the library!

Happy Thanskgiving!

We're taking the week off from book reviews! We'll be back on Tuesday, December 3rd with more books the staff at the West Allis Public Library has been reading!

Size 12 is Not Fat by Meg Cabot

Heather Wells is a former pop idol whose mom ran off with her fortune.  She now works at a private New York college as an assistant dorm director.  Her dorm is soon nicknamed “Death Dorm” because of the many suspicious deaths that have taken place in it.  She triumphs over cheating boys, bad luck, and her so called imperfections to solve mysteries and keep her students safe.  This funny and entertaining series, now including five titles, features memorable characters and is an enjoyable light read.  

Checkout Size 12 is Not Fat @ the library!

Children of the Jacaranda Tree by Sahar Delijani

The opening chapters of this compelling book, describing the callous treatment of a political prisoner, can rival any scene in any dystopian science fiction novel. But this is not a book about a cruel future. The political prisoner in this book is a woman in post-revolutionary Iran, a woman who is about to give birth. In 1980’s Iran, many young men and women who disagreed with the Islamic Republic were swept off the streets and out of their homes and into prisons. Young children were left behind and had to be cared for by extended family.  In one such family, these children became the CHILDREN OF THE JACARANDA TREE, referring to a tree in their grandparent’s garden. While the grandparents and aunt struggled to care for them, imprisoned parents turned their thoughts to their children to comfort them through their most difficult times which included poor living conditions, isolation, torture and execution. Life outside of prison was also not easy. The theocratic government interfered in every aspect of private life, imposing dress codes, rationing and curfews. An eight year war with Iraq brought fear of bombing raids and the death of many young men.  Sahar Delijani, who was herself born while her mother was in prison, follows this extended family for nearly thirty years.  When, in 2009, political strife in Iran leads to protests in the streets and results in beatings and arrests and killing of young men and women, history appears to be repeating itself. The children of the Jacaranda tree and their own children are drawn into the same fight their parents, grandparents and aunts and uncles fought. 

Check out Children of the Jacaranda Tree @ the library!

Pretty in Plaid by Jen Lancaster

Jen Lancaster's life is easy to trace. In fact you need look no further than her closet to trace her East Coast roots to her Mid-western childhood to her further exploits in the Greek system and settling in the real world work place. Life isn't all green sashes and Gucci purses, but sometimes those little things give extra character to our stories. And it's not just the sashes and purses, it's the stories that those items tell, whether it's learning that cheaters don't really win in the end or that sometimes money can't buy friendship.

If you are looking for a light, funny read, and have an interest in fashion, Jen Lancaster's Pretty in Plaid will keep you laughing, and considering your own fashion past.

Check out Pretty in Plaid @ the library!

Letting it Go by Mieiam Katin

In this book, graphic artist Miriam Katin explores hatred and resentment and the difficulty of Letting it Go. Katin was born a Hungarian Jew during World War II. She and her mother endured much hardship trying to survive. For this reason, she has hated Germany and particularly Berlin nearly all her life. Eventually she immigrated to the United States, married and had a son. When her son informs her of his intention to live Berlin, she must struggle between two emotions: her love for her son and her hatred of Berlin. After two visits to Berlin, she finally realizes that Germany and Berlin have changed and she must do so as well. She observes that just as the evil of the past must be acknowledged, so must the changes brought about by a new generation and new attitudes. Graphic books are not only for children and teens. Many are thoughtful examinations of adult experiences.  Letting it Go is a graphic memoir in which the author uses skillful pencil drawings as well as words to explain her struggle to leave the past behind. 

Check out Letting it Go @ the library!

Elsewhere by Richard Russo

Richard Russo is the author of many popular novels about upstate New York and the failing economy of its small towns. But Elsewhere is a memoir in which he recounts his life with his mother, a rather difficult woman. Russo grew up in Gloversville, New York, a blue-collar town built around the glove making industry, including the tanning of hides to make leather gloves. Having divorced Richard’s father, Jean Russo was a single mother in the 1950’s, a time when such a life style was rare. During his childhood the presence of his grandparents and other relatives helped to blunt the effect his mother’s strange personality (black moods, fits of anger, ingratitude, anxiety and compulsions) had on him.

At the age of eighteen, Richard left New York to attend college in Arizona and his mother, seeking a new life, accompanied him. Unfortunately, she brought her problems with her. She did not find the new life to be a better life and the new surroundings did not improve her mental health. In Arizona he alone dealt with his mother’s crises and compulsions. A pattern was set. She would try a new job or new apartment. Something would go wrong, forcing her to quit or move. She would return to New York, then back to Arizona. Whenever things went wrong, she could not cope and expected her son to help her pick up the pieces of her life. Richard Russo is a successful man. He earned a PhD and became a college professor. He married an understanding woman and started a family. He became a very successful author whose books were made into movies. But his mother’s unreasonable needs were always in the background of his life. She moved wherever he moved. She had exacting requirements for job, apartment and home furnishings and could tolerate nothing less. She relied on him from his boyhood until her death when he was in his sixties. After her death, he realized that she had probably suffered from an actual mental illness, obsessive-compulsive disorder. Russo’s book expresses the frustration those living with difficult family members feel. His observations are not a guide on how to deal with a mentally ill relative but rather an explanation of the difficulties a family in such a situation faces.

Check out Elsewhere @ the library!

The 19th Wife by David Ebershoff

Jordan Smith’s estranged mom is accused of murdering her polygamous husband.  He goes to visit her in jail and realizes she’s innocent.  He was kicked out of the community of Firsts in Mesadale where she lives when he was a teen but must go back to free his mom.  In addition to Jordan’s story the author tells the tale of Ann Eliza Young, Brigham Young’s so called “19^th wife”.  She did exist and helped eliminate polygamy from the Mormon religion in the late nineteenth century.  Rich with history and interesting relationships, this book raises emotional and ethical questions that don’t have easy answers. 

Check out the The 19th Wife @ the library!

The Cuckoo's Calling By Robert Galbraith

In THE CUCKOO’S CALLING, author Robert Galbraith (a pseudonym for the famous J.K. Rowling) creates an old-fashioned detective novel, one that, despite being set in 21^st century London, could easily fit in 1930’s Los Angeles.  In  1944,  mystery writer Raymond Chandler defined the American private detective: “Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid…He is the hero… a man of honor…He is a relatively poor man. He is a common man…He is a lonely man…” In this book, private detective Cormoran Strike embodies these characteristics. A former British soldier who saw action in Afghanistan, he is down on his luck. Broke and forced to live in his seedy office, unable to pay his rent or the temporary secretary he is too kind to dismiss, he cannot see a way out of his current troubles. Fortune, in the form of a wealthy client, arrives at his door on the same day as his new secretary, Robin. Strike is asked to investigate the death of a supermodel who fell from the balcony of her third story luxury apartment. The death had been ruled suicide by the London police three months earlier, but the client, the model’s brother, is not satisfied with the finding.  Strike’s investigation leads him across class lines, from nouveau riche musicians, designers and film producers to old money families to immigrants and drug addicts. His ability to talk to all types of people, retain their information, sort through lies and truth and organize it all into a logical progression are the skills Strike uses to solve this mystery.  There are no surprising twists, no gimmicks and no improbable strokes of luck in this book. Strike solves the mystery with straight-forward hard detective work: interviews, deductive reasoning and paying attention to seemingly unimportant details. THE CUCKOO’S CALLING will appeal to the reader who appreciates a well-written, realistic mystery.

Check out The Cuckoo's Calling at the library!

Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher: The Epic Life and Immortal Photographs of Edward Curtis

Epic life pretty much sums it up! In the early 1900’s many believed, including Edward Curtis, that the American Indians and their cultures were going to disappear. Curtis photographed American Indians and documented their languages, religions, alphabets, art, etc. as much as humanly possible. He felt that this endeavor was a race against time. This artistic and cultural achievement was also radical for its time, because the majority of this country believed that American Indians had no culture or religion and were barely human. Curtis sacrificed everything for this undertaking, his business, family, money and reputation. This book is recommended for readers that enjoy biographies of larger than life personalities or histories of the United States, photography, the America West, or American Indians.

Check out Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher @ the library!

Her Last Breath by Linda Castillo

An Amish father and his children are run down in their buggy on a quiet country road in the heart of Amish country.  It appears at first glance to be an accident but on further investigation it may be a purposeful hit and run.  Kate Burkholder, police chief in Painters Mill, Ohio, must find out who did this before the murderer comes back for the rest of the family.  This series has great character development, suspense, and twists that you won’t see coming.  On her fifth Amish thriller, Linda Castillo is only getting better. 

Checkout theKate Burkholder series @ the library!

The Middlesteins by Jami Attenberg

Edie Middlestein is eating herself to death and her family is not taking it well. She, the only child of parents who could deny her nothing, had loved food all her life. From childhood through college and law school, an unhappy marriage, and motherhood, food had comforted and consoled her. By the time she is sixty, she is well over 300 pounds and her weight has cost her her job and her husband.  Richard Middlestein abandons his wife, leaving the family home and planning divorce. His decision causes his children, daughter Robin, son Bennie, and daughter-in-law Rachelle, to turn against him. They ostracize him and strive to convince Edie to lose weight. But it is not an easy task. Robin, having once been overweight herself, angrily confronts her mother about her lack of self-control.  Rachelle stalks her mother-in-law, following her from one fast food restaurant to another, horrified but unable to do anything about it. She reacts to Edie’s weight by restricting the food she serves to her husband, children and even friends, cooking inedible healthy meals. Only Bennie is able to do something practical, sitting in Edie’s kitchen all night to prevent his mother from gorging on snacks the night before surgery. But self-control comes from within and the Edie’s family, despite good (and not so good) intentions, is unable to change her destructive habits.  The MIddlesteins is a story about a dysfunctional family that is dysfunctional in its own unique way. It is told with wry humor and warm affection for the members of this imperfect family.  

Check out the Middlesteins at the library!

Longbourn by Jo Baker

Many, many authors have tried to capture the genius that is Jane Austen (and more specifically, the delight that came from the characters in Pride and Prejudice).  But Longbourn by Jo Baker isn’t an Austen rip-off.  It isn’t even a story that tries to answer the question “What happened after Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy got married?”  Instead, Baker has told the story of the Bennet household from the point of view of a rather unlikely character: the Bennet’s housemaid, Sarah. 

Sarah (about Ms. Elizabeth Bennet’s age) has been with the family since she was a little girl.  She does everything that is expected of a housemaid including: soaking and scrubbing muddy petticoats, feeding the pigs, emptying chamber pots and washing the never-ending supply of dishes being used by a family of seven.  She does not complain. But she does wonder what it would be like to live a life where no one expected you to do anything and you could act on your own free-will. 

The joyous thing about this novel is that we see only glimpses of the Bennet family; a line of conversation here and there, but not much more.  The pages are filled with Sarah’s daily activities and those of the other staff: Mr. Hill and the housekeeper Mrs. Hill, the young housemaid Polly and a new hired man, James, who has a shadowy past.  There is little here of Jane’s pining for Bingley or Elizabeth’s annoyance with Darcy.  Sarah slowly sets off down a path towards her own romance but will she end up with the mysterious James or Mr. Bingley’s handsome and charming servant Ptomely? 

Baker takes us with Sarah on her journey from young lady to woman and we get to see just how much she longs for a world outside of service.  We see her set off with Elizabeth to Kent to visit the Collinses and her amazement at the metropolis that is London.  When she is given the opportunity to leave Longbourn and serve at Pemberly, will the grand house be the new responsibilities and distractions she needs?  Will she marry in order to get out of service?  Or will she go a direction all her own without the help of her benefactors and friends? 

Longbourn by Jo Baker is a fun and new twist for even the staunchest Jane Austen fans.  

The Other Typist by Suzanne Rindell

Rose Baker is a young woman in the typing pool of the New York City Police Department during Prohibition. She is plain, quiet and prudish about life.  However, she is also lonely. So when Odalie, a glamorous flapper with bobbed hair and expensive clothes and jewelry, joins the clerical staff and reaches out to Rose for friendship, Rose is intrigued. Like a moth to a flame, Rose is drawn into Odalie’s dangerous life, becoming her roommate, sharing her clothing and jewelry, accompanying her to speakeasies and parties and running spurious errands on her behalf.  Odalie is mysterious, with more than one version of where she and her wealth came from: perhaps prostitution, bootlegging or a family inheritance.  Whatever the source, she lives well and is generous in sharing her comfortable life with Rose. But she also exacts payment for her generosity, expecting Rose to blindly do her bidding. And Rose, having been drawn in by Odalie and unable to return to her old life, cannot deny her.  How much will Odalie ask of Rose? How far will Rose be willing to go on Odalie’s behalf? Tension builds throughout the entire book and these questions are not answered until the last page. 

Check out The Other Typist @ the Library!

Self-Inflicted Wounds by Aisha Tyler

Are you familiar with the comedian Aisha Tyler? Maybe you've seen her hosting Whose Line Is It Anyway, or remember her as Ross's girlfriend on Friends, or perhaps you remember her Talk Soup days. No matter where you've seen her, you know she's smart observant and the kind of person you'd want to have coffee with and maybe hear some of her stories.

Here's your chance, grab Self-Inflicted Wounds, a cup of coffee, sit down with Aisha. She'll tell you stories about growing up vegetarian before it was cool, being a tall, dorky girl who didn't quite fit in until she found people like her. From her days frying up chicken in her mom's best shirt, to her trip down the mountain on a snowboard that resulted in a broken arm at the worst possible time, you'll laugh with Aisha. And like any good friend, she wants you to learn from her mistakes, and she'll be laughing with you.

Check out Self-Inflected Wounds @ the library!

City of Women by David R. Gillham

The year is 1943 and while most of the men are fighting in the war, Berlin is a city of women.  One of these women is Sigrid Schroder.  Her husband is a soldier at the front and she is living with his mother.  On the surface Sigrid appears to be a good German, going to work every day and sacrificing for the war effort.  In actuality she has a Jewish lover and is helping move Jewish men, women, and children to safety.  In contrast to a lot of books about World War II the Germans aren't all bad just as the Jews aren't all victims.  The author captured the feel of wartime Berlin when everyone was looking over their shoulder and had to watch what they said lest they be turned into the Gestapo.

This story will make you reflect on what you would do when faced with the decision Sigrid faces:  help and risk your own safety or sit by while people are murdered.  Checkout City of Women @ the library!

The Maid's Version by Daniel Woodrell

In 1929, a dance hall in a small Missouri town exploded, killing forty-two people.  One of them was pretty Ruby DeGeer, who, although poor and poorly educated, easily attracted the attention of wealthy men.  One of these men was banker Arthur Glencross, who employed Ruby’s older sister, Alma Dunahew, as his maid. Alma had good reason to believe that Glencross was responsible for the explosion and made herself few friends in town by saying so. Although there were others who could be suspected, Alma was unyielding in her certainty of his guilt.  Her fight for justice eventually turned into what was considered bizarre behavior.  Finally, practically catatonic, she was committed to the Work Farm. Her disappearance into her own misery left her youngest son, John Paul, motherless at an age when he still needed his mother. Dependent on odd jobs and the kindness of neighbors for most of his childhood and youth, John Paul resented his mother’s obsession and the loss of his family. The rift these hard times created between mother and son lasted into John Paul’s adulthood and Alma’s old age. In The Maid's Version, Alma tells her story to her grandson with hope of healing the rift. Author Daniel Woodrell is a well-respected author whose last book, Winter's Bone was made into a successful movie. In this book he draws a vivid picture of small town life in depression-era Middle America, clearly depicting the great divide between rich and poor, weak and powerful. 

Check out The Maid's Version @ the library! (Check out the new version of County Cat too!)

Run, Brother, Run

Run, Brother, Run: a Memoir of a Murder in My Family by David Berg



Run, Brother, Run is a true tale of murder and how it affects a family.  The book is written by David Berg, whose older brother was murdered under mysterious circumstances by hit man Charles Harrelson (father of actor Woody Harrelson).  While a good portion of the book deals with the crime, police investigation and the aftermath of the court case surrounding Alan Berg’s murder, much of the story is about the Berg family.  It is a story about memory and how tragic events can alter the way you see the past and the future.

Berg begins with memories from his childhood using wit and honesty to portray life in a very stressful home.  Here is one example:

“That was 1946, the year our father met Dorothy Heinrich in a Kalamazoo diner.  She would one day become his wife, but for now, she was his waitress.  “Dot” was five ten, with the sultriness of Rita Hayworth.  Mom was four ten, with the temperament of Henry VIII- so there you have it.  It wasn’t the first time Mom had caught Dad cheating, but it was the last.  Our parents would scream at each other for what felt like hours.  Alan would cry in bed beside me, and then, to my astonishment, get up and go down the hall to intervene.  Mom would shriek, Get out of here, Mr. Buttinski, this is not your business!  Get back in that bed! “(4).

Berg talks a lot about growing up in the Berg household.  A big part of that time was David and Alan’s father wanting his sons to go to medical school.  Alan took quite a few detours before getting there (including leaving the Navy due to holding a floating crap game) but Alan finally made it into the medical program at the University of Texas.  After a fight with his father, Alan took off instead of registering for classes.  The hopes of having a physician in the Berg family had died yet another death.

David becomes a lawyer much to his father’s dismay.  When Alan disappears in May of 1968, David admits to being busy starting his new career.  But it is clear that certain things don’t add up.  Alan had been involved in gambling, but he was also very in love with his wife who was then pregnant with their third child.  The police refused to start an investigation, insisting that Alan must have just taken off.  But David and his father knew different.  They began hunting for leads which took them down a whirlwind of different paths, most of which involved paying a fee of some kind.  When Alan’s body was finally found six months later, questions surrounding Charles Harrelson and a business associate of Alan and David’s father swirled in earnest. 

There isn't a happy ending to this tale.  There is no justice for the dead, and none for the surviving family.  David berg tries his best to use his knowledge of the law to lay out the facts surrounding his brother's murder and subsequent trial.  It is a stark tale of true crime in America in the 1960s.

  

Transatlantic by Colum McCann

        

In TRANSATLANTIC,  prize-winning author Colum McCann combines three historical events, all involving the crossing of the Atlantic Ocean from North America to Ireland:  the lecture tour of escaped American slave, Frederick Douglass, in 1845, just at the onset of the potato famine; the first non-stop transatlantic flight made in 1919 by John Alcock and Arthur Brown; and the multiple crossings made by former Senator George Mitchell in his efforts to broker the 1998 Belfast Peace Agreement which ended “The Troubles,” a three-decades long period of conflict between Nationalists (Catholics) and Unionists (Protestants).

           

These three events are bridged by a succession of women, the first of whom, Lily Duggan, crosses the ocean in the other direction, leaving Ireland for America to escape poverty and famine. Life is not much easier in America, but Lily prospers. After serving as a washerwoman and nurse in Civil War battlefield hospitals, she marries and raises a family. Her daughter, Emily, is a bookish girl who eventually becomes a journalist and covers the story of Alcock and Brown’s take-off from Newfoundland. Emily and her daughter, Lottie, cross to Ireland by ship where Lottie marries and has her own daughter, Hannah. Together Lottie and Hannah bear the personal suffering brought on by “The Troubles,” and then Hannah alone must deal with the consequences of the financial collapse of 2008.

The progress made in 150 years can be astounding. People regularly travel by plane across the Atlantic Ocean. Political and religious violence ceases to terrorize the citizens of the British Isles. And in 2008, another black American visits Ireland, this time rather than an escaped slave he is the President of the United States. The abolition of slavery, the development of intercontinental flight, a treaty to end a long, violent struggle are important developments in the course of history.  And, inevitably, the course of history affects the lives of the ordinary people of the world.  

Check out Transatlantic @ the library!

Songs of Willow Frost by Jamie Ford

Jamie Ford, author of Hotel On the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, returns to his Seattle roots in his second novel Songs of Willow Frost.  First we meet William Eng, a lovable Chinese American orphan who lives at the Sacred Heart Orphanage.  All of the boy orphans are given the same birthday when they arrive at Sacred Heart- September 28^th: coronation date of the honorable Pope Leo XII.  On this day, all of the boys are shepherded downtown to see a motion picture as a special birthday treat.  This year (1934) the boys are taken to a showing of Cimarron.  William hunkers down in his seat to share his popcorn and Orange Crush with his best friend when something unthinkable happens.  During the Follies reel, the audience meets a new actress with a sweet, sad voice: Willow Frost.  William is stunned.  Though he can’t explain how, he knows that the woman on the screen is in fact his mother whom he hasn’t seen in five years.  Shaken, William tries to ply information out of the sisters at Sacred Heart but to no avail.  He know his Ah-ma wouldn’t have abandoned him and believes that if he can just get out of the orphanage long enough to see her in person at an upcoming show, she’d take him home again.

Life in the orphanage is not easy.  But William knows that he has it a lot better than many orphans- some roam the streets begging, others are sent off to labor farms or to work in factories.  And while he feels the strong pull to run away from the orphanage in order to find his mother, he knows that if he is caught, he probably won’t be sent anywhere as nice as Sacred Heart.  Bolstered by his best friend, the adorable but blind Charlotte, the two hatch a plan to escape from the orphanage and trek to the 5^th Avenue Theatre to see Willow. 

Charlotte and William manage to sneak out of Sacred Heart and even see Willow’s show.  Afterwards, they wait with a line of other admirers outside the Stage Door.  William gets Willows autograph and calls her Ah-ma and when the actress begins to cry William knows that he’s finally found his mother.  But she is whisked off in a taxi and William is left sitting in the alley for hours.  One of the performers takes pity on William and Charlotte and gives them backstage tickets for the next performance.  There, William gets a chance to speak with Willow before her next performance.  Unfortunately, Sister Briganti arrives to take the two orphans back to Sacred Heart before William can get all of the answers about his past.

Will William find Willow again?  Will he ever find out how he wound up at Sacred Heart?  But most importantly, does Willow still want her little boy?  Songs of Willow Frost is an interesting tale about the bond of parent and child, duty to society and the history of early motion pictures.  While it does not combine the number of issues as did Ford’s first novel Hotel On the Corner of Bitter and Sweet,  Songs of Willow Frost is not a Sophomore Slump of a book.  Ford brings new life to a new era in Seattle and the reader is more than happy to go along for the ride.

Check out Songs of Willow Frost @ the library!

Into the Darkest Corner by Elizabeth Haynes

Catherine Bailey meets Lee, a gorgeous police officer whose charismatic nature makes everyone like him.  She falls in love but soon his true character shines through and she becomes scared of him and his controlling ways.  She plans an escape which goes wrong.  Fast forward four years later.  Lee is behind bars but Catherine’s life has been changed forever.  Suffering from both post-traumatic stress and obsessive compulsive disorder she is spending her time living in fear.  Lee is released from prison and Catherine knows he will come after her.  Told in alternating chapters of flashbacks and present time this novel will cause you to think twice about domestic violence.  Checkout Into the Darkest Corner@ the library!

Between My Father and the King by Janet Frame

Janet Frame was an award winning author from New Zealand. Between My Father and the King, a collection of some of her previously unpublished and uncollected short stories, is an excellent introduction to this talented author who died in 2004. The stories, many told from the point of view of children or spouses in working class families, are stories of hope and disappointment. The best plums grow on the neighbor’s side of the fence. A vagrant’s book collection is not worth a fortune. Grandmother, on her first visit, does not live up to her grandchildren’s expectations. The daughter who was given a lovely lace dress is not allowed to attend the dance. And the King does not sufficiently appreciate the father’s service in World War I. In these and other stories, the author creates a true voice for a child or adult who hasn't got much in life except acute powers of observation. The reader can feel the anticipation of having a new dress, plum jam, hot scones, a cup of tea, a visitor, a new piece of furniture or set of dishes. And when the anticipation leads to yet another disappointment, the resigned acceptance of those used to disappointment makes each story heart-breaking but not maudlin.

Check out Between My Father and the King @ the library!

Queen's Gambit by Elizabeth Fremantle

The Queen’s Gambit is a chess opening in which a pawn is temporarily sacrificed to give the player a strong center presence. In The Queen's Gambit by Elizabeth Fremantle, the life of Elizabeth Parr, sixth wife of Henry VIII, becomes a chess game after her marriage. In order to keep her position and her head, she must plan carefully, stay at least one move ahead of her enemies, and arrange her allies carefully around her. To succeed at this game, she needs the loyalty of her maid-servant, Dot, illiterate and lowly-born, who understands the importance of keeping the Queen’s secrets, even at great danger to herself.

Katherine Parr was thirty, twice-widowed and childless, when her modesty and common sense caught the eye of King Henry VIII. His proposal of marriage could not be refused.  Katherine was forced to put aside self-interest to marry a husband who was by this time elderly, sick, bad-tempered and dangerous. Henry was a man who could suddenly turn on those close to him and order anyone, even his queen, banished, arrested or executed. Katherine endured some close calls, but with the help of servants and friends and her own intuition about the King’s moods, she was able to outwit her enemies and outlive the king. In this book her story is told from two points of view, Katherine’s and Dot’s.  Each was a woman who rose above her station. Katherine, of aristocratic but not royal blood, became Queen of England. Dot, the uneducated daughter of a thatcher, became the Queen’s most trusted retainer. Together they navigated the chess board of the English Court, the gossip, the intrigues, the back-biting, the maneuvering for favor.

After Henry’s death, both Katherine and Dot married for love. Dot created a happy home and family, but Katherine’s fourth husband, Thomas Seymour, proved to be a social-climbing philanderer. Neither of Katherine’s positions, Queen and Dowager Queen, could provide happiness or safety. After careful strategizing in Henry’s Court kept her alive, she died at age thirty-six, as so many sixteenth century women did, in childbirth.

Check out The Queen's Gambit at the library!

Seven Houses in France by Bernardo Atxaga

George Orwell has observed that colonialism is destructive to the imperialists as well as the native population of the colonized country. This maxim would appear to be proved in SEVEN HOUSES IN FRANCE except that the reader cannot imagine the Belgian officers in this book any less cruel and avaricious had they never left Belgium. As members of King Leopold’s Force Publique in the Congo Free State, they are charged with fighting the rebels and forcing the local people to harvest rubber from the jungle. However, they spend most of their time amusing themselves in cruel and debauched activities. The commander of the outpost, Captain Biran, is also, through poaching mahogany and ivory, amassing a fortune so his beautiful wife can own seven fashionable houses in France. The camaraderie of the officer corps is disturbed in August, 1904, when a new soldier, Chrysostome Liege, arrives. He is a mystery to his fellow officers, telling them little about his himself. He provokes jealousy and resentment by proving to be the best marksman at the outpost. And he is an enigma and threat to them because he is a devout Christian who refuses to join in their sport of raping native women. When these officers become aware that Chrysostome has become sincerely fond of a native woman, they seize the opportunity to torment him. The resulting tragedy has a domino effect of successive acts of violence as the Belgians turn on one another.

The pervasive cruelty in this book is not graphically described, but the Belgians’ casual attitude toward it is revealing. The Congo Free State was the site of an unprecedented man-made human disaster in which King Leopold enriched himself by exploiting the local people and natural resources of the area. KING LEOPOLD’S GHOST by Adam Hochschild is a well-researched book on this subject.         

Check out Seven Houses in France @ the library!    

A Change in Altitude by Anita Shreve

Margaret and Patrick set off on a Kenyan adventure.  He’s a doctor who will be doing research and running clinics.  Margaret is a photographer who ends up getting a job with the local paper.  Their friends suggest a trip up Mount Kenya and the couple agree even though Margaret has doubts about her abilities.  She ends up being the slowest member of the group and when a tragedy occurs she is blamed by all, even her husband.  Their marriage will never be the same.    They avoid talking about it and Margaret develops an attraction for her coworker.  Anita Shreve delves into human emotion and uses her personal experiences in Kenya to bring the country to life.  Check out A Change in Altitude @ the library!

A Thousand Pardons by Jonathan Dee

Ben and Helen’s marriage is falling apart. A weekly visit to a marriage counselor only makes things worse.  When Ben, filled with despair, makes a series of reckless decisions, he disgraces himself and destroys his family’s comfortable upper middle class life. Ben disappears into rehab and jail, leaving Helen to deal with the resulting shame and financial problems. She puts their house on the market and moves with her pre-teen daughter to New York City. Despite little work experience, she lands a job with a small public relations firm and proves to be gifted at crisis management.  Her advice, no matter who the client is or what offense has been committed or even if the accusation is true or false, is to make a sincere apology. This strategy always works and the reputation of the restaurant, politician, or grocery store is salvaged. Helen parlays this success into a job with a larger, more prestigious firm. Her job becomes a career but, as the job becomes more demanding, her relationship with her daughter deteriorates. Ben meanwhile returns to the home he had rejected. He secretly reconnects with his daughter through text messaging and hopes to build a semblance of the life he had once so thoroughly rejected. However, the sincere apology does not work as well on Helen as an insincere one does on the general public. She is too angry, the hurt is too personal. Unless she can overcome her resentment, the family will remain torn. A Thousand Pardons demonstrates that it can be harder to accept an apology than make one. 

Those following the Ryan Braun case/ situation may find this to be an interesting spin on apologies and public relations. Check out A Thousand Pardons at the library!

Alex by Pierre Lemaitre

Alex by French author Pierre Lemaitre will be published in September by MacLehose, and imprint of Quercus Books.  What's so special about Quercus?  They were the lucky publishing group who snagged Stieg Larsson's wildly popular Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium) trilogy.  Quercus is again hoping to strike crime fiction gold with Lemaitre's newest novel.  

There are a few similarities between Larsson's Lisbeth Salander and Lemaitre's Alex Prevost. Both are strong, vibrant characters who are stuck in rather unfortunate situations.  And like Dragon Tattoo, Alex has another main character who is trying to solve a crime/mystery; in this case, police Commandant Camille Verhoeven.  But the similarities pretty much end there.

Camille has worked for the brigade criminelle for years and there is only one kind of case he won't work: kidnappings.  It isn't any wonder, considering his wife (who was eight months pregnant) was abducted on her way to the hospital and later found murdered.  But Camille's boss has forced him to be the lead investigator on a new case which involves, of course, a kidnapped young woman.  The Commandant tries his best to ignore his emotions and does what he can to try to find missing Alex Prevost.

Alex was out for a night of shopping and dinner when she was pummeled by a very large man, tossed into a van and taken to a secret location.  When she wakes, the man forces her into a rough wooden crate and suspends her from the ceiling of what appears to be a warehouse.  After who knows how many days, Alex realizes that the water and dog kibble the man has been feeding her daily, was not to keep her alive but to attract a horde of rats that live in the building.  More terrifying than being eaten alive by rats, however, is the fact that the crate is too small for Alex to even stretch out and, being a nurse, she knows her muscles are beginning to deteriorate.  

Camille is working with a very small pile of evidence.  There was witness who saw the woman get thrown into a van, there is a little bit of vomit on the street and not much else.  Camille knows that the more hours that pass, the less likely they are to find their victim alive.  After a stroke of luck identifying the van that the criminal used, the police now know who they are looking for.  When they find the man, he throws himself off a bridge into oncoming traffic rather than tell the police who Alex is or where he has hidden her. Back to square one and the clock continues ticking.  More investigation into the kidnapper leads to the discovery that the man's son went missing year or so ago.  When they go to ask questions at the former home of the son's girlfriend, they discover the son's body.  Is Alex really just the victim of a kidnapping or is she a murderer?  By the time Camille and his men have discovered the warehouse where Alex was taken, she has managed to escape.

This book is full of twists and turns and is a fascinating detective story.  A word of warning, however for the folks who were put off by the sexual violence in The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo- this also appears in Alex.  But it is a thriller that will keep you guessing.  A thriller that might just answer the question: is there a worse way to die than being eaten alive by rats?  

Alex by Pierre Lemaitre is available everywhere September 3rd.

Death of a Dyer by Eleanor Kuhns

The sequel to A Simple Murder finds the main character, Will Rees, back on his farm in Maine. From the previous novel, Will is still working on reconciling with his son, David, and sorting out his feelings for Lydia, a woman from a Shaker community.  Will also has to deal with his need to travel and was born under “a traveling quilt.” His farm and hometown hold good and bad memories for him. When he is back, his boyhood friend is murdered. The son of the murdered man is under suspicion and the widow asks Will to investigate the matter. The author evokes the setting of post-Revolutionary War America and the hardships and joys of that time. Will Rees is a strong, morally upright man trying to navigate his time and character that I hope will continue. Though it is a sequel, this novel can also be enjoyed without reading the prior book.

Check out Death of a Dyer @ the library!

Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear

In this first of many Maisie Dobbs mysteries a seemingly open and shut infidelity case leads the private investigator to more questions than answers.  Maisie looks into a place called The Retreat where severely injured soldiers form the Great War live out their lives with others who understand what they have been through.  Their savings are pooled and used to pay for the community.  This case brings up memories for Maisie from her own time serving as a nurse in the Great War and her backstory is gone over in detail.  You’ll love the smart, independent, and very intuitive Maisie Dobbs and be happy to know she has many more adventures.  Checkout Maisie Dobbs@ thelibrary!